A YORK technology company has updated its pioneering anonymous recruitment process after utilising the expertise of a student developer.

Bytemark, which is a hosting provider operating out of a data centre in Nether Poppleton, launched its Careers site in 2015 after re-evaluating its recruitment process in a bid to create a bias free hiring process.

The resulting anonymous recruitment process, which was designed to address concerns about diversity, has now been updated by Bytemark’s placement year junior UX developer Hannah Pirie.

Prior to the update the site had been used to process more than 200 applications and successfully hire 14 members of staff.

It works by asking applicants to submit a covering letter in the first round listing their skills. They are only identifiable by their handle - which omits any information about, age, gender or race.

However, despite the success of the programme, Bytemark recently undertook further research on their hiring process. This identified several areas which could be improved to further encourage applicants from all backgrounds.

Launched last week, the new Careers site designed by Miss Pirie has introduced a number of usability elements - including the faces of a potential applicant’s interview panel and detailed overview of the application process.

Miss Pirie, who went to Huntington School and is on a placement year with Bytemark from Lincon University said: “As a female computer science student it feels great to be directly contributing to diversity in my industry.

“I throughly enjoyed working on the project, despite some of the challenges it posed from a development point of view.”

Bytemark believes the technology industry has a “serious problem” with diversity and inclusivity, apparent through statistics about women and other minority groups. For example in Core STEM occupations, the proportion of the workforce made up by women has decreased from 22 per cent to 21 per cent since 2015.

Steve Urmston, product manager at Bytemark, said: “Hannah has been a real asset to Bytemark during her time with us.

“It’s a pleasure to support a local student and to help them build experience in software development. We all benefit from this.”